Christmas was great for dressage rider/trainer/new mother Adrienne Lyle, but it’s the new year that brings the promise of even more excitement for the Olympic and world championships team silver medalist.
When Zen Elite Equestrian Center owner Heidi Humphries talked to Adrienne after the Tokyo Olympics, “I knew she wanted to support the U.S.,” Adrienne remembered, “and then a short while later, she approached me about helping her find a horse to buy that I would train for her.” (to find out more about Heidi, click here or look at the second feature on this page.)
After Heidi told Adrienne she was in the market for a new grand prix horse, the rider started shopping. With the Paris Olympics on the horizon for this summer, that sort of quest easily could have been fruitless.
“I’d been looking for quite a while, and had been over to Europe a few times,” Adrienne recalled.
Then, “In a funny way, we happened to find two in one trip.”
Helping her assess the prospects was Debbie McDonald, who had been her mentor since Adrienne’s working student days. Debbie, an Olympic medalist who is the former technical advisor and chef d’equipe for U.S. dressage, noted that to be eligible to represent a country in the Paris Games, a horse would have to be owned by a citizen of that nation by a Jan. 15 deadline.
So in mid-December, the clock was ticking. One horse was lined up for Adrienne to try; then, as she and Debbie were on their way to Europe, another came up for sale.
“It was a situation that happened to be, timing-wise, good,” said Debbie.
The first prospect, Lars van de Hoenderheide (Negro X Layout), a 13-year-old Belgian warmblood, turned out to be in Debbie’s view, “just a lovely solid citizen. He really is a good horse.”
In his last start, at Kronenberg in the Netherlands in December, he won the freestyle with 78.475 percent, although his best freestyle finish was seven months earlier in Compiegne, France, where he won with an 81.210. He was based at Van Olst Horses in the Netherlands and shown by world champion Lottie Fry of Great Britain, who is petite, while Adrienne is tall. But Debbie thought, “A little bit of change in rider size” could be handled fine by Lars.
Lottie Fry and Lars van de Hoenderheide
The second horse, Helix (Apache X Broere Jazz), was a year younger and had less ring experience than Lars, but has “a ton of potential,” in Debbie’s view. Marina Mattsson of Sweden showed the horse internationally in 2023, where he had good finishes but no victories. Two months ago, Cathrine Laudrup-Dufour, the Danish star who was fourth in the Tokyo Olympics, took over the ride.
“We went there with the idea of buying one horse,” said Debbie, but Heidi thought it was a good idea to have a veterinary check for both.
Although they each passed the vet, “It was never the idea to go and buy two horses,” Debbie emphasized.
Then on Christmas Day, Adrienne got a text from Heidi.
“She asked if, in a perfect world, what did I think about getting both? I said, `Oh my gosh; absolutely,” recalled Adrienne.
“Paris definitely is something I’d really love to do,” she said, but added, “I’m accepting with horses, sometimes things work out and sometimes they don’t. Now we definitely have a focus.”
She noted that since she has always developed her own Grand Prix horses, getting two who were so far along “already was a big leap for me.”
Adrienne enjoyed touching base about the horses with Lottie and Cathrine, who were helpful.
After her daughter, Bailey, was born last autumn, Adrienne, 39, started gearing up her fitness. She hadn’t ridden for the last four months of her pregnancy, the longest she’d been out of the saddle in her career, so she went into high gear.
“I knew if I wanted to be ready for show season, I had to hit the ground running. As soon as the baby was born, I was doing fitness training twice a day. I feel I’ve gotten back to where I was before, or pretty darn close,” she revealed.
With both horses scheduled to arrive this week at Adrienne’s winter base in Florida, it’s going to be an especially busy time. There are plenty of 3- and 4-star rated shows in Wellington this winter, and Adrienne will participate in them as she learns how best to showcase the horses’ talents.
But time is short before Paris, and she has a lot to do.
Adrienne Lyle and Lars van de Hoenderheide, who has just arrived in Wellington. (Photo © 2023 by Christian Simonson)
“I think they’re both lovely horses, both have charming personalities and have had really lovely homes with good care,” said Debbie.
“Adrienne being the rider that she is, I think she’s going to be able to do quite a decent job pretty quickly.”
While the circumstances aren’t ideal, the challenge is doable.
“Trying to get something for Paris this late is pretty slim pickings. I think the right horses just came up at the right time. It was just a very fortunate situation for Adrienne and Heidi,” said Debbie.
Adrienne, who is married to veterinarian David Da Silva, is balancing motherhood and her profession.
Her daughter is “a good little barn baby” who likes to stroke horses’ noses and sit on her mother’s lap when she teaches lessons. And there are a lot of those.
Adrienne’s students include Pan American Games team gold medalist Christian Simonson, for whom Heidi bought Fleu de Baian, a 3-star winner at Grand Prix and Grand Prix Special, who had been trained by the Netherlands’ Adelinde Cornelissen.
Quinn Iverson, who started as a working student for Adrienne and is “quite a little handy horsewoman” is riding Heidi’s King’s Pleasure, as well as Gremlin, a horse owned by her longtime supporter, Billie Davidson. Adrienne also works with her 2022 world championships teammate, Katie Duerrhammer and Kylee Lourie’s Paxton.
In addition, she has a five-year-old and a seven-year-old she is training for Heidi, as well as five-year-old Furst Dream, for Betsy Juliano. Betsy is also the owner of Salvino, Adrienne’s Olympic and world championships mount, who is being ridden, but whose plans for the season have yet to be decided.
Adrienne Lyle and her Olympic and world championships mount, Salvino. (Photo © by Nancy Jaffer)
Luckily, Adrienne can handle being busy.
“I’m very, very thankful and now it’s time to put our heads down and go to work and see what we can do,” said Adrienne.
“I’m one who always likes to stay quiet and let the results do the talking, so that’s going to be my plan.”
At the same time, she added, “Regardless of any goals we have, the horses will dictate their training and competition schedule. Keeping them happy and stress-free during this transition to their new home is the most important thing.”
The horses should “never feel any additional stress in their lives just because we have goals we want to accomplish. So we will make sure their health and happiness are our number one priority and we will work around what is best for them.”
